Keir Simmons is chief international correspondent for NBC News, based in Dubai.
As Gulf state leaders gathered in a Riyadh hotel this week to discuss the growing Middle East war, strikes from Tehran blasted outside. Iran was sending a clear message, Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister said.
“The attack was timed to coincide with this meeting,” Saudi’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud told NBC News. “To intimidate those present. To send home the message that Iran will not stop.” As the war drags into a third week, Persian Gulf states are being increasingly bombarded with retaliatory strikes from a defiant Iran, caught in the middle of the war initiated by the U.S. and Israel for which President Donald Trump has offered shifting rationales and a changing timeline. It’s forcing Gulf nations into a stark decision: Whether to join the fight. During the meeting in Saudi Arabia Wednesday with representatives from Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Pakistan, Qatar, Azerbaijan, Syria, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, bin Farhan Al Saud said the trust between Iran and neighbors had been shattered, and the prospect of neighboring nations entering the war should not be dismissed. “I think it’s important for the Iranians to understand that the kingdom, but also its partners who have been attacked and beyond, have very significant capabilities and capabilities that they could bring to bear should they choose to do so,” he said. Israel launched a widespread strike on Iran’s world-largest gas field, South Pars, triggering retaliation from Tehran against key energy sites across the Gulf Arab states. Molten fireballs and belching smoke over the Middle East early Thursday signaled a dramatic escalation in the Iran war — and its threat to the global economy. Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi wrote in a post on X that the response to Israel’s attack on their infrastructure “employed FRACTION of our power.” “The ONLY reason for restraint was respect for requested de-escalation. ZERO restraint if our infrastructures are struck again. Any end to this war must address damage to our civilian sites,” he said. The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs posted on X Thursday that the Iranian escalation, if it continues “will have dire consequences for it first and foremost, and for the security of the region, and will cost it dearly, casting a shadow on its relations with the countries and peoples of the region, who will not stand idly by in the face of threats to their capabilities.” Countries across the Gulf are anxious to see an end to the conflict, but while some want the U.S. to find an off ramp as soon as possible, others are more concerned about the U.S. leaving the Iranian regime not only intact, but vengeful, according to one U.S. official. All six Gulf Cooperation Council ambassadors — Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman — met with members of the House Foreign Affairs and Armed Services Committees and senators from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in closed-door sessions Wednesday where they pushed for expedited arms sales and discussed the escalation of the conflict, two congressional aides who knew about the discussions told NBC News. It was a marked shift from pre-war talks. The Omanis, for instance, were confident the U.S. and Iran could reach a deal and initially sought to act as a mediator in the dialogue. “They are panicked and looking for how they can protect their population,” a third congressional aide said. A senior gulf official told NBC News that Iran’s retaliation on energy and civilian sectors was a big mistake, and the economic and tourism hit to the region is only growing. “The mood has very much turned into anger,” the official said. The official said that Gulf states did not want to be drawn into the conflict and were not going to allow airspace to attack Iran. “Everyone is interpreting it differently than before. They made enemies out of their neighbors.” Oman has made clear that Gulf states, while increasingly feeling the impact of the conflict, do not want a wider war, and actively called for a ceasefire and emphasized de-escalation, a second senior gulf official said. “We didn’t decide the war, but we are dealing with the consequences,” the official said. “We want it to be over.” Leaders in the United Arab Emirates are angry at how things have unfolded, and officials in Bahrain and Kuwait are having a hard time defending their territory and managing the conflict, according to a person familiar with the ongoing discussions. Many countries are getting hit multiple times a day, and the UAE in particular is bearing the brunt of Iranian attacks; so far, 1,714 drones, 334 ballistics, and 15 cruise missiles have been detected by the UAE from Iran, according to UAE data. While many of the Iranian strikes target military bases, there are increasingly civilian attacks, including in Qatar on Wednesday. The strike on the Qatari energy facilities was seen as an extremely serious attack which will have reverberations for weeks and months to come, the person said. Some across the region were recently briefed on the possibility that Houthi rebels based in Yemen could enter the fray, should Tehran order the militant group to attack in the Red Sea, the person said. The U.S. official told NBC there were no indications yet the Houthis would get involved, in part because they are entangled in issues closer to home in Yemen, but that could change. But one of the senior gulf officials said the Houthis were on standby, ready to act. In Saudi, the ministers from Gulf states affirmed during their meeting that such attacks could not be justified, and called for Iran to immediately halt its attacks. Bin Farhan Al Saud said when the war ends, rebuilding trust with Iran will take a long time. “If Iran doesn’t stop, that is the mood also I heard in this room earlier, immediately, I think there will be almost nothing that can re-establish that trust,” he said.
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